posted at 8:02 pm on August 15, 2012 by Allahpundit

Consider this progress. Four years ago, it was The One himself smearing McCain from the stump by warning that his opponents would try to make an issue out of the fact that he doesn’t look like the other presidents on the currency. This year, he’s content to let Biden do the racial pandering while offering him political cover as necessary by playing dumb.

Unbelievable:

Biden’s comment sparked Romney to call the Obama campaign one of “division and hate and anger.” But Obama, speaking to PEOPLE in Dubuque, Iowa, seemed unrattled by the controversy. He said Biden’s words needed to be considered in context; that he was only saying “you, consumers, the American people, will be a lot worse off if we repeal these [Wall Street reform] laws as the other side is suggesting.”

“In no sense was he trying to connote something other than that,” Obama added.

Pressed to say whether Biden’s wording was unfortunate or something he’s okay with, the president sighed. “The truth is that during the course of these campaigns, folks like to get obsessed with how something was phrased even if everybody personally understands that’s not how it was meant,” Obama said. “That’s sort of the nature of modern campaigns and modern coverage of campaigns. But I tell you, when I’m traveling around Iowa, that’s not what’s on people’s minds.”

I can’t believe there’s a person on either side who watched the clip of Biden, heard “they’re” become “they,” “going to” become “gon,” and “you” become “y’all” — all in service to an embarrassingly overwrought metaphor about “chains” — and doesn’t think he was engaged in an excruciatingly condescending racial pander. It’s one thing for liberals to acknowledge the pander and defend it, as sleazy as that might be. But let’s please be big boys and girls and agree on what he was obviously, patently trying to do. Biden himself all but acknowledged it this morning when he said he’s often criticized for saying exactly what he means, and that he’ll never change. Fair enough. He’s owning it. Time for O to stop pretending, especially since he’s capable of far more subtle racial appeals to black audiences than Vice President Doofus stooped to yesterday. He knows exactly what Biden was doing. He just doesn’t care.

Here’s former Democratic Congressman — and Obama campaign co-chair — Artur Davis lowering the boom on Biden on CNN today. Not a huge surprise given that Davis is now a Republican who’s campaigning for Romney, but a righteous clip nonetheless. My only quibble is that he gives Obama far too much credit for his own allegedly positive tone; as noted above, Bambi is by no means above using racial politics to help his cause, especially if he’s got a willing surrogate to do the dirty work for him. When you’re done here, go watch Former Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder hit Biden hard on Fox News this afternoon too. I think he lets Biden off easy — the point of yesterday’s shtick wasn’t to “joke about slavery” but rather to make Romney and Ryan somehow complicit in the practice — but whatever. The more heat O takes from Democrats on this, the more he’ll think twice about sinking even lower. Exit quotation from Paul Ryan: “We’ve gone from hope and change to anger and division and blame and attack. I think people are going to see through this.”

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He wouldn’t do it – but it would be great if Paul Ryan started a speech talking about his ancestors in Wales struggling in the coal mines,and then toss the speech aside saying he grabbed Joe Biden’s by mistake. Turn this thing into comedy hour and make them lose their ever-loving minds!

those were from april, before he became a candidate. the next polls will come out with him standing next to a squish. looking like 2008 more and more.

renalin on August 15, 2012 at 10:02 PM

You keep believing that sweetie. In case you’ve forgotten, I live in Florida AND I’m a senior citizen. Plus, I do something you probably don’t, read the comments and editorials in the small town local papers. Got news for ya, there’s a heck of a lot more of those than there are Miami Heralds or Orlando Sentinels.

Yes, it would be, and that’s close enough that I would try to go myself.

Flora Duh on August 15, 2012 at 10:13 PM

Palin went to The Villages during the 2008 campaign, and there was an awesome turnout for her. We drove over from Tampa. We would do the same for R&R as well (though of course we’re bracing for the RNC at this point; not sure if there’ll be any opportunity for regular folk to see anything during that circus)

Team Obama is not about to put Hillary on the ticket as that would be, in effect, putting Billy Jeff on the ticket. And while they are more than happy to Lewinsky him to get him on the stage in Charleston, under scripted circumstances, they won’t want to deal with him on a daily basis or worry about what he’s going to say between now and November. Plus, it’s no secret that Moochelle and Hillary literally hate each other, as do their respective staffs.

TXUS on August 15, 2012 at 8:45 PM

Don’t be so sure. The chorus is growing for Biden to be replaced, and the Obama campaign is sinking like a rock. They are likely focused on little else than finding a “game-changer” that will bring back the frenzy of 2008.

If Biden steps down on his own, “refuses” to run for re-election, even though barack has “begged and begged” him to stay on the ticket, well, gosh, what’s barack to do? It wasn’t HIS idea. He WANTED Biden on the ticket, had FULL CONFIDENCE in Biden, but Biden just INSISTED on stepping down, wanting to spend more time with his children, because you know he lost a wife and child in a car accident so he really values family, and he’s not getting any younger and he knows he and barack would have won and that would be four more years away from his family and did he mention that barack just BEGGED and BEGGED him to reconsider and that Mooch-elle even met with Mrs. Biden and they had a BIG MEETING where barack and Mooch-elle just begged and begged Biden to stay but he loves his wife and kids so much and he’s been a LOYAL PUBLIC SERVANT for 40 years and he really wants to be a normal family guy even though barack is just DEVASTATED that Biden has decided ALL ON HIS OWN to step down and spend more time with his family which he has always valued ABOVE ALL ELSE since that car accident many years ago. So, who’s barack going to tap for the VP slot even though he NEVER REALLY wanted to change VPs and this is just so, so shocking and devastating. It has really thrown the Obama campaign for a loop, coming out of absolutely nowhere and all. Hey, here’s an idea: how about Hillary? Has anyone thought of that?

Oh, and one more thing. Weekly Standard thinks the announcement of Biden stepping down and Shrillery moving into the VP slot will come just at the GOP convention begins.

Sounds about right. Barack plays to win — by any means necessary.

Rational Thought on August 15, 2012 at 10:37 PM

I just don’t see the upside for Hillary. She’s the frontrunner for her party in 2016, regardless of whether she serves as VP or not. S, why would she risk being on a losing ticket? If I was her, I wouldn’t risk my aspirations to save that loser. She probably couldn’t save him if she tried.

But even I have to admit, when Palin threw out a suggestion to the Obama campaign Tuesday night with Greta Van Susteren to replace Joe Biden, I scratched my head. In response to Biden’s latest “disgusting comment,” Palin said the following:

Greta if that’s not the nail in the coffin — really the strategists there in the Obama campaign have got to look at a diplomatic way of replacing Joe Biden on the ticket with Hillary and I don’t want to throw out that suggestion and have them actually accept the suggestion because then an Obama and Hillary Clinton ticket would have a darn good chance of winning but really Joe Biden really drags down that ticket.

Immediately, the liberals at Mediaite responded by posting the headline – and their liberal commenters had a field day. Similarly, the Huffington Post covered it, and 2,768 hysterical comments later, the liberals are still ranting. Other mainstream outlets like ABC covered it as well. McCain even came out to say it, too!

Obama came out today to respond, dismissed the idea, and further attempted to pathetically excuse Biden’s “chains” remark.

In less than a day, Palin set a trend. Liberals were even crankier than usual and Republicans were unexpectedly quiet. After all, she literally suggested what would be beneficial to Obama.

As we all know, Obama is a drag. We also know that Romney’s been lackluster. Neither has been able to energize their bases. That changed for Romney when he announced Paul Ryan as his V.P. nominee. Suddenly donations poured in. After a full day, Romney managed to raise $3.5M! No, it’s not the $7M McCain raised after announcing Palin but still, it’s a larger surge of energy than Obama has yet to capture in 2012′s campaign.

Further, Romney and Ryan got rallies which were impressive in size –like the crowd of 10K in North Carolina! Again, not really the 60K Palin got in Florida, but it’s still more energy than Obama has been able to gin up this year. As it stands now, Romney and Ryan have a clearer shot than ever before of picking up some battleground states and putting themselves on a path to victory and moving us a step further to better days for America.

If Obama decided he needed a wild card to energize his base, what’s he going to do? Take advise from Sarah Palin? How would his base respond? The following article which describes Palin as a “smart political operator” via the Hayride says it pretty well:

So just in case the Democrats might think about making a switch to Hillary, along comes Sarah Palin to suggest it.

And now they can’t do it even if they wanted to. Obama can’t be seen as taking advice from Sarah Palin.

[…]

So she’s helping the Romney ticket by writing Biden off. The Romney ticket wants Biden right where he is.

You can read the whole thing here.

So thanks to Palin, it appears that Obama is (for the lack of a better phrase) chained to Joe Biden for this go around.

renalin – you so F up my experience here. I could have a better conversationw/ my dog

koaiko on August 15, 2012 at 10:56 PM

just providing a dose of reality so that when the fall comes in november it won’t hurt so much.

look around you. kids with iphones and cars, living with their parents.we are in a real world of hurt.

renalin on August 15, 2012 at 11:45 PM

Oy. Unremitting pessimism isn’t any more realistic than blind optimism. It is most definitely not 2008 any more. For one thing, Obama now has a record, and most folks don’t seem to care for it very much. Right now, things are pretty clearly going Romney’s way. He has weathered the storm, and the momentum has shifted since last Saturday. Now, after having shot his wad over the summer, Obama, he and his people are back on their heels, as the tide has shifted and Romney surges.

We’ll see how well Obama does getting outspent by the Republicans by a significant margin down the stretch. I like our chances. It’s starting to look like the fourth round of the Ali-Foreman fight.

It is best to watch the video of Biden saying the chains statement.
He suddenly starts speaking in a southern drawl acting like the down south, plantation owning white guy giving advice about slavery to all the black people in the audience.
Biden is an idiot.
Obama is a flim-flam, phoney fraud.

I guess the thing I wonder is, was it a planned slur against Romney or just a foolish and convenient one?

We know that is the way democrats talk to their constituents, from the Hilary days of “Ah, Aint NoWays Tired” and they get a pass.

If they sent Biden out to make fun of Romney that way and make the suggestion republicans or Romney intend to bring back slavery, even as hyperbole, will they stab him in the back and blame him today to get Hilary in his place on the ballot?

It is rumored that England’s infamous Jack the Ripper” was an imbecilic member of the Royal Family. The killings suddenly ceased because the Royals found out who was murdering the prostitutes and subsequently kept “Jack” under house arrest.

Obama should do the same for his imbecilic member of the Royal Family.